Vancouver-based Rocky Mountaineer locked out 109 staff June 22 in a dispute that threatens to continue until the luxury passenger train provider’s season ends October 6.
The company and its union, Teamsters Local 31, are not only at an impasse on issues such as overtime and scheduling, they can’t even agree on how many contract offers have been discussed.
Rocky Mountaineer says it has made seven offers. The Teamsters say there was only one – a proposal the union said was so poor the company must have known it would be rejected.
The dispute has simmered under the radar since day 1, but it is significant for business leaders and decision-makers in B.C.’s tourism sector because it could tarnish the image of British Columbia as a vacation destination, say recent Rocky Mountaineer passengers who are unhappy with the railway’s service.
“Poorly trained replacement onboard attendants actually made our intended trip-of-a-lifetime something of an ordeal to endure,” said Gerald Binczik, who spent more than $10,000 with his wife to travel on the train in a glass-domed Gold Leaf coach a few days after the lockout started.
“Their scant service was clumsy and seemingly begrudged, and their narration of our trip was so outrageously bad that it was laughable and painful in turns.”
Binczik and his wife are both wildlife biologists who live in Texas. The couple, who told Business in Vancouver that they have never been in a union, said passengers should be able to cancel their trip and get a refund.
Rocky Mountaineer’s executive director of communications, Ian Robertson, confirmed that his company does not offer refunds nor does it grant compensation to disgruntled customers.
“We carry more than 100,000 guests within our season and, labour dispute or no labour dispute, there are always guests for whom we fail to meet their expectations,” Robertson said.
“We survey guests after each trip. The guest service ratings that we have received this year are as high as previous years.”
Robertson would not reveal how much the luxury travel provider is paying its replacement workers nor whether it has hired as many replacement workers as there are locked-out employees.
On June 15, Rocky Mountaineer workers voted overwhelmingly to strike. They were locked out by the company one week later.
“We’ve put seven offers on the table – seven offers,” Robertson said. “All have been rejected by the union.”
But that’s news to Teamsters Local 31 president Stan Hennessy.
“I haven’t seen one offer yet. I don’t know what offers he’s talking about.” Hennessy said that during a meeting in early July, Rocky Mountaineer CEO Randy Powell told the union that the company wanted to roll back workers’ wages 2% in each of the next three years. Powell also wanted the on-board attendants to start sharing hotel rooms with each other during overnight stays.
Rocky Mountaineer’s luxury trips differ from other offerings, such as Via Rail’s Edmonton-to-Vancouver run, in that passengers travel during the day and sleep in hotels at night so they don’t miss any of the trip’s scenery.
“When a worker is on the train for 16 hours and then they go to a basic motel for something to eat and a shower, the last thing they want to do is share the room with somebody,” Hennessy said.
“Right now, Rocky Mountaineer pays no overtime. The union put a position forward to start overtime after 11 hours. For a union that’s pretty reasonable in my mind.”
Saying he didn’t want to negotiate through the media, Robertson declined to provide details of his company’s offers.
“Our offers have addressed some of the concerns of the union,” he said. “The offers we proposed reflected the reality of where the tourism industry is at. We continue to see a slump in the U.S. market and have not recovered to pre-2008 levels.”
Robertson added that salaries for his company’s onboard attendants are at the high end of the tourism-sector pay spectrum and that the company has had little trouble finding replacement workers.
Hennessy said some of the workers can make about $40,000, including tips, during the train’s six-month season.
“The majority would make about half that,” he said.
Hennessy vowed to tell union affiliates overseas about Rocky Mountaineer’s lockout if the dispute is not resolved by the fall.
“The reason we haven’t done that so far is that we were hoping common sense would prevail,” he said. “If they don’t have customers next year, it hurts everybody. But I don’t intend to quietly go away.” •
